Category Archives: food issues

Days 28-29

28-

Breakfast: puffed rice cereal, rice milk, pork bacon

Lunch: rice, soy sauce, grapes

Dinner: rice, turkey, broccoli, sweet potato (with maple syrup and brown sugar), grape juice

12:45pm- diarrhea

11:45pm- diarrhea

29-

Breakfast: fried potato, turkey lunch meat

Lunch: rice, broccoli, soy sauce, grape juice

Dinner: chicken stock, chicken, cabbage, bok choy, carrots, gf pasta into “soup” 🙂 (Thanks Noah!)

7:15pm- green, paste-like, semi-formed

 

I slept for about 12 hours last night. I have already taken a nap today. I’m not feeling better.

Health inventory

I am feeling excessively whiny. I am hoping that if I record the full whine I can stop repeating bits of it to Noah and anyone else who will listen. It is hard to not talk about it even though I know it annoys people to hear about.

Starting at the top, because I often do that. Head hurts. I have a headache in the forehead part of my skull. I have a raging headache in the back of my skull where I have my usual minor headache caused by looking down too much. I have a fractured tooth and that isn’t feeling good. I get a crown in just over two weeks. My TMJ (yes, this one has a real diagnosis from a real doctor) is acting up like mad and both sides of my jaw hurt like crazy. I’ve clearly been clenching and fighting the clenching and that makes me ache something fierce. I also have a ton of sinus pressure and I feel like I have a cold.

My neck hurts. The muscles supporting my skull are all corded with knots.

My shoulders and arms hurt really badly. Surfing was a lot of very unfamiliar motion and even moving my arms hurts. I can feel a lot of knots I’m not used to having. My range of motion is impacted. Surfing was fun but very hard. Luckily my forearms aren’t as painful as usual. (I’ll thank my lucky stars for that one.) I’m having a lot of general joint pain (I include the TMJ with that) and my shoulders/elbows/wrists/finger joints are all painful. It isn’t my normal “typing fucks me up” pain–it’s different.

My chest and upper back feel sore, like I was punched a lot. (And yes, I do know what it feels like to be punched a lot.) My abdominal muscles right below my ribs are still so sensitive that gentle touching hurts. Luckily the pain has come down a few notches and I will no longer scream if the kids idly brush me. *phew*

Then we get into the intestine region of the torso. Oh holy hell. It is improving! That’s a great thing. After the plane ride just about anything would be an improvement. I feel tender and sore. My lower back aches really badly, but I’m used to that. It spiked into much more intense pain when I was bleeding last week thanks to cramping but it isn’t as bad now. *phew* But my belly region is very uncomfortable and sad.

My hips hurt. My hips hurt so much. My thighs hurt. My knees hurt. My calves hurt. My ankles hurt. Seriously, my ankle hurts so fucking much I can’t sit cross legged. My feet are sore and tender.

Have I mentioned that I don’t feel good?

Tomorrow I will be blessed with a meal cooked by someone else that is within plan and multi-course and is likely to help me feel loved and taken care of while having flavor. Noah is still being my hero with cooking for me, but he has less experience with this range of restrictions. He’s doing his best, but it is hard to adapt to an elimination diet. Especially while he is still cooking different stuff for him and the girls that follow our more normal diet.

Today the girls asked the babysitter to make them ramen for lunch. When I smelled it I almost started crying because I wanted it so much. I am committed to figuring out what is making me sick, because clearly I took some inflammatory food out and then put it back and my body is freaking the fuck out but it is hard feeling denied food. It is excruciatingly hard on a daily basis. I feel like I don’t deserve food.

My friend told me it is great that I haven’t fallen into the “I can’t eat anything” trap and now I feel ashamed of myself because I totally want to say that over and over. I’m trying so hard to be positive. I think it would be easier if my kids weren’t eating my favorite foods in front of me while I can’t have any.

It is shocking to me in an ongoing way how visceral food is. I read people write things about how food is just fuel. Oh man. It totally isn’t. It is love and comfort and bonding and right now I’m shut out of my favorite forms. Holy shit this is hard.

I am trying to keep my whining to myself. It is hard. I’m trying to keep up with the whirl of activities but it is hard. I feel dizzy and weak. My friend pointed out this weekend that I am drastically under caloried for the amount of exercise I’m doing and she’s right. 17 days till the half marathon and then I will be cutting back my exercise a lot until I have food more under control. I do want to do this race though. I’m still upset with myself for paying for a 10k I didn’t do this year.

Tomorrow I drive to San Pablo. That will be a good trip. In the evening Pam is coming over. She’s about to head off for a long visit with family on the other side of the world so I have to store up my Pam attention while I can. Friday we are going out to Modesto to see friends for the day. (Luckily the friend I am going with is very happy to do most of the driving. *phew*) Next week I have another visit with the woo-allergy doctor and therapy and a massage. I am one lucky, supported person. The week after that I see the Kaiser specialist (I have low hopes and much bitterness in my heart), have dinner with a friend I haven’t seen for a bit, have a dentist appointment to get a crown, hopefully we will get to decorate the tree with the home school group, and Pam is coming over–all that before Thanksgiving. T-day we are staying home while I cry about not being able to eat a real Thanksgiving dinner. I just can’t watch someone else eat what I want to fucking eat and can’t. I can’t. I would be so mean and self-involved and such an asshole. So we are staying home. Then that weekend I run the half marathon.

December will be slower than November, for one thing less exercise. I’m not driving much in December. Other than the grocery store the only driving I have booked for December is therapy. Given that the kids have been wanting to stay home while I have therapy because they want the screen time I’m not even sure if we will be making the park days.

I could seriously use a whole month of not doing much. For one thing, I need to build the trailer that is sitting on a pallet in my driveway. Also: I’d like to finish the planter box project in the back yard. I have been so exhausted I have not been physically able to do the work. I feel pathetic, but bodies have limits.

I feel like an asshole because numerous people have asked me how they can help and I don’t have good answers. One friend told me to give her a list of foods and she would meal plan for me. I *can’t* follow through on that. Every few days I seem to be changing what is excluded or included because I have no real guidance. The best I can do is what I’m recording here. That isn’t great.

I don’t actually think there is much help I can get. I’m lucking in to going to someones house where they already follow a diet that lines up with my elimination diet. I only had one or two “no’s” to add to their list of no so I didn’t have to think hard.

I feel like I can’t think very well. I feel confused and stupid.

Despite feeling shitty I continue to be grateful that I get to be married to Noah and I’m really glad for my kids. They are so awesome.

Days 24-27 (Not really “on plan”)

24-took Ibuprofen and pot.

Breakfast: gf pancakes, strawberries, banana, peanut butter, maple syrup, grape juice

Snack: yogurt parfait with blackberries, strawberries, granola, and orange juice (that wasn’t part of the parfait)

Lunch: cantaloup, watermelon, some other green melon, grapes, cheese, butter crackers, chocolate with macadamia nuts, and some pineapple juice (on the plane meal)

Dinner: 1/2 a turkey wrap, 1 skewer of chicken teriyaki and a few bites of rice

2:30 am I woke up with lots of solid poop.

3:00am second surprise volley during what I thought was just peeing. Not boding well.

10:45 am small pieces that shoot out really fast (I always worry about accidents when it gets harder to hold in)

11:40 lots of yellow diarrhea

On the plane I had terrible gas pain.

25- took pot and fish oil

Breakfast: chocolate milk soaked french toast with banana, peanut butter, maple syrup, chocolate sauce, black tea, sugar, cream (So damn good)

lunch: chicken fried rice with gyoza (almost certainly made with egg)

Snack: Dole whip with pineapple

dinner: more fried rice, one french fry

8:20am- light diarrhea

1:45pm very solid poop

7ishpm yellow, paste-like, lots and lots

8pm- yellow, only a little bit, mostly formed

10:30pm greenish, medium sized logs pastey.

26- took pot and fish oil

Breakfast: fried rice and gyoza (still tainted with egg)

Lunch: bag of pineapple, pieces of sweet bread, pineapple soda

Dinner: 1/2 a turkey sandwich, 1/2 a slice of lemon cake

Sometime in the am I pooped and didn’t record the time. There were many semi-solid pieces.

1:45pm- yellow, loose, lots of little pieces (I wrote people in the book. Ha.)

3 more rounds of burning, awful diarrhea on the plane but I didn’t get times and I was in the midst of changing time zones anyway. So much horrifying gas pain on the plane. Terribly painful bloating.

27- took nothing

Breakfast: fried potatoes, turkey wrapped in pork bacon.

Dinner: rice, turkey, carrot, cabbage

I felt like shit all day and couldn’t eat more.

1:45pm- yellow, mostly formed, in several pieces

6:30 pm diarrhea

7:30 pm diarrhea Burn baby burn

That brings me up to today. When I haven’t pooped yet. Wheeeee.

I seriously think I should stop eating pineapple. But it was good.

I’ll catch up on data eventually.

I haven’t been able to talk myself into eating much today. I feel too awful. I’ve eaten breakfast and breakfast wasn’t big. But I’m managing to produce a very large amount of poop. I didn’t eat much yesterday either. Yesterday I ate: fried rice (about a cup), two gyoza, a bag of pineapple, a big chunk of sweet bread, half a turkey sandwich, and half a lemon loaf slice from Starfucks. And I spent the plane ride running to the bathroom for horrible diarrhea.

Today no diarrhea, but lots of solid poop. WHAT THE EVER LOVING FUCK IS WRONG WITH MY INTESTINES?!

But I’m pretty sure I should stop eating pineapple. My tongue feels like I’ve been licking a cheese grater.

WHINE WHINE FUCKING WHINE.

My body feels so yucky. I’ve done very little today. I feel very ashamed of myself for doing little. But I feel so bad.

So tired.

I am so tired there aren’t many parts of my body that aren’t in overwhelming pain. A 5 is probably the average level of pain for my body parts with some pieces spiking to 8 and 9. I didn’t really follow the elimination diet in Hawaii–I had too little control over cooking. As a result most of the time I had the most heinous gas pain I think I have ever experienced. Double over in pain and can’t breathe bad pain.

I am much more motivated to figure out the food stuff. I’m going to get strict on food again and work through this puzzle.

I am not going to do the full marathon in March. I feel like a steaming pile of dog shit. I can’t eat adequate calories for the amount of physical activity I’m doing let alone marathon training. I’m hurting my body with pushing myself to continue to exercise long after every part of me hurts.

The surfing was rad, but I was in so much pain when I arrived that by the time I left I felt nearly incoherent. And today is worse. The abdominal muscles you use to push yourself up over and over on a surf board hurt so bad that my kids gently touching my chest causes me to shriek with pain.

I tried not to whine too much, I think I did ok. I did do some whining about being in pain, but I didn’t make it the focus of the whole trip. I still participated. I did have fun. I don’t think I brought everyone down.

It was a nice trip. I’m glad I went. I had fun talking with grown ups without having to filter. I was blurty and I over-shared a lot of things, but I rarely have a safe environment to do that any more. Luckily these are people who have been through the crucible already and they aren’t too freaked out by my stories. *phew*

I’m glad I went. I really want to bring my kids there.

Day 23

Breakfast: gf pancakes, strawberries, maple syrup, grape juice

Lunch: turkey soup and homemade smoothie: (orange juice I froze from our tree last year, blueberries, strawberries, banana, grape juice)

Dinner: we went out. It was glorious. We went to a Mongolian BBQ restaurant we love. I had lamb and chicken and bell peppers and cabbage and bean sprouts and carrots and I feel like there was at least one other vegetable. Pineapple out of a can. Wheat noodles. Soy sauce, sugar, cooking wine, vinegar, a splash of bbq oil, I winked at the sweet and sour sauce but didn’t really add much. It tasted really good.

Yesterday I woke up at 1:30am with diarrhea. I assume Toxic Smell was getting even with me. It was so tasty I don’t care. It’s been a rough few weeks of sometimes having diarrhea but not getting to eat what I want.

At 9:50 am There was a long, on the thin side (but not pencil thin, closer to a normal log)paste-like log. So it is up and down in consistency.

I’m very likely to go off-plan this weekend. Unfortunately for you all, I will tell you all about my poop as a result. You’re welcome.

Days 21 and 22 (whoops)

21 first- no pills

Breakfast: gf pancakes, banana, peanut butter, maple syrup

Snack: gf English muffin, peanut butter, raspberry jam

Dinner: soup made with turkey stock, turkey, venison, bok choy, soy sauce, green beans, carrots, bell pepper, celery

It was a festive pooping day.

2:30am- green/black, cloudy, not solid (blueberries!)

7:45am- formed poop, two logs

9:15am- three small brown pieces, very sticky and hard to wipe up

11:45am- yellow, multiple soft pieces that quickly dissolve

Day 22- took pot and fuck the rest of the fucking puke-inducing vitamins

Breakfast: gf pancakes, peanut butter, maple syrup, banana, grape juice, peppermint tea

2nd Brekkie: rice cereal, rice milk, maple syrup, turkey bacon

Lunch: two chicken soft tacos from Taco Bell with no cheese (I was told I could have wheat…) This was my first eating out in over three weeks. It tasted sinfully good.

Dinner: turkey soup (what a let down after the AWESOME of fast food)

3:30am- small yellow pieces, log shaped, smooth looking like toothpaste

? afternoon- small chunks but not real distinctive

 

So far the doctor of woo says that I am cleared for wheat (THIS IS SO EXCITING), sugar, and all cooking oils/fat. *phew* The dairy treatment didn’t take (and given how many sub-parts I am “reacting” to he says that isn’t surprising. If you are only “reacting” to one small part of something one treatment is often enough. If you react to every subcomponent it can take a couple of treatments.) so we redid it and I get to cross my fingers for Monday.

So I had wheat today. Let’s see how festive my poop is tomorrow. Awesome.

Day 20

Pills: birth control (last day), Ibuprofen, fish oil, multi (last day because apparently allergy), B-complex (same deal), probiotic (last day for now but “after treatment” I should restart).

Breakfast: gf pancakes, peanut butter, banana, maple syrup, grape juice, toast with raspberry jam (yes, I reacted).

Lunch: rice, turkey, cabbage, carrots, blueberries, potatoes

Dinner: venison, bell pepper, rice, soy sauce, cabbage, carrot

 

4am: completely solid brown poop. The canonical “log”.

9:15am: long, thin, very smooth and green.

Cycles

A long time ago I asked a friend to stop saying something to me. She refused to honor my request. We didn’t speak much for many years. Many years later she apologized because she hadn’t understood what that request was really about.

I feel like I’m in a similar situation again. And I don’t know what to do about it. I feel like maybe what will happen is I just won’t speak to this person for a long time. How long? I don’t know. I never know that kind of thing in advance. With some people I think it will be a short time then I never hear from them again.

Like J. She’s gone. I miss her so much. But her life is overly full. And I don’t want a life like hers so I haven’t talked to her in about a decade. Will I ever see her again? I don’t know. Probably only if I hunt really hard to find her.

The strange thing is, I have multiple people from middle school who keep up with me and track me down every so often. Even though they moved out of state. They want to still know me. It’s weird.

But I don’t know how to guess which relationships will last or why. Long, long ago I thought Jenny was done with me and she would never come back. I was wrong. She’s never really left. She’s just on a long rotation sometimes.

I don’t know how to trust people. A few weeks of silence often feels like years. Time distortion for the win. I think it is funny that multiple people today asked how the voting discussion went yesterday. It didn’t happen. Lots of enthusiasm, no desire to show up.

My feelings are so all over the place. I’m up and down and up and down and up and down. I’m getting vaguely threatening emails from Kaiser. I turned down going to see their psychiatry department and they don’t like that. I wouldn’t be completely shocked to have a police officer knock on my door to “check on me”. Which… on one hand is good… on the other hand… fuck you.

So many feelings. I will find out on Wednesday if I am supposedly “clear” to eat wheat and dairy. I so hope this works. I’m willing to drink a little snake oil if it firms up my poop so I can eat wheat. That’s fine with me.

I would do the poop transplant in a minute if it were available as a solution for me.

I found it weird that I *should not* have regular olive oil but cold pressed is dandy. Apparently the “regular” is treated with a chemical to make alllllllll the oil come out and that chemical isn’t actually great for people. Awesome!

I’m going to jump topic to describing what the doctor does a little. He puts this little strap around one arm, a little like a blood pressure cuff but worn below the elbow. That arm receives “the electrical impulse that matches the food”. The other arm you stick straight out and he tries to push it down.

It sounds so fucking crazy. But on some of them I could hold my arm up and some of them I couldn’t no matter what. He starts with arsenic because no one can hold their arm up and you don’t feel bad about the idea of being allergic to arsenic.

He moved on to a forking long list of things to try. And did you know how many little subchemicals exist in most of these things? I’m apparently “allergic” to like 6 different parts of milk. Most of those would be mostly helped by just drinking raw milk. $16 a gallon, here we come.

But he can break down the wheat problem too. Yes gluten, but apparently I have problems with multiple different proteins and binders other than gluten. And supposedly he can treat them all. He does them in layers checking for where your allergic reaction is in your body. Then he tap-tap-taps your back. It’s wacky and I feel kind of doubting… but I’ll try it.

It’s funny having a good doctor experience and a bad doctor experience in the same day.

I am in such a bad mood. I want to cry. I can stop taking birth control pills since they obviously aren’t helping me. I can stop taking almost all of the vitamins since I seem to have an issue with b vitamins. That’s kind of sunny.

Sadly, no problems with the fucking fish oil. Deep sigh.

I’D BE OK IF I WERE ALLERGIC TO FISH!!!

Alas. We don’t get to write our own allergy list.

I should go do something else. But all I want to do is cry.

All the woo.

Apparently this wacky shit is “next generation NAET” which isn’t all that encouraging. But Placebo is one of the most effective drugs! So I’ll try it at this point.

The doctor found 23 reactions (some to families of things and we didn’t divide it up yet), which could be an allergy could be an intolerance could be… who the fuck knows. These things make my body react.

Foods: Eggs (found that one by myself!), dairy, sugars, wheat, oats, yeast, chocolate, corn, fruits, herbs/spices, msg, nuts, and oils/fats.

Me: Apparently I’m allergic to my digestive enzymes and stomach acids as well as some of my blood components, my hormones, and my neurotransmitters.

I’m also allergic to pollen, grasses, weeds, vitamins (particularly B vitamins… which I’ve been taking religiously “for my health”), and probiotics.

Cheers, motherfucker.

Supposedly many of these can be treated (with this wacky ass combination of acupressure and electromagnetic stimulus) to the point where they don’t bother me any more. If that is true, I’ll fucking try it. Kaiser just tells me to eat more Fiber 1 cereal so at least this sounds like a fucking plan.

When I got home I discovered that the groino from Kaiser I’ve been working with on the PMDD decided that she didn’t want to keep trying options and she referred me to psychiatry. I called psychiatry and said, “I use pot. Will I be treated or told that no one will treat me?” “Well, you will have to stop before we can treat you.” “Then let us not waste my time with an appointment. Have a nice day.”

I emailed the groino and told her I will not be troubling her with my problems again in the future.

So today we did “treatment” for wheat, oils, sugars, and dairy. I go back on Wednesday to see how well it took. Hopefully I will be able to eat in Hawaii. *cross fingers*

Also: he says I would be way better off if I permanently switched to raw dairy. I see his point. Even after treatment, raw milk is easier to digest–period.

Well, I’m trying to be hopeful but not stupid. It’s not a miracle. Nothing is. But it is a little hope.

Day 18

This is a really emotionally hard process. If I wake up and have a normal poop, I feel like I am allowed to eat. I’m allowed to try something. If I don’t wake up to normal poop it feels like I am bad and I must be punished with terrible food I really don’t want to eat all day. I don’t get to have anything with flavor or texture I want.

Yesterday I woke up with normal poop. So I tried a few things. Today I didn’t wake up with normal poop. So I have to punish myself more.

When does an elimination diet become disordered eating and self harm?

Yesterday I swallowed all the usual pills minus pot. I was tired before I started and I knew I wouldn’t be able to do 9 miles if I had pot in my system.

Breakfast: rice cereal, rice milk, grape juice

lunch: leftover fried rice

snack: raspberries and banana (the kids are eating their Halloween candy and this is the closest I can get to sugar and watching them eat is making me feel so bad. As usual I am not good enough to deserve what other, better people get.)

dinner: bell pepper stuffed with venison, cabbage, rice, carrot.

Yesterday I pooped at 9:30 in the morning. It was solid, formed and what poop should be. So I got cocky. I have already paid for my luxuries yesterday. This morning is not so easy.

Don’t know if it is the banana, raspberries, or venison. I god damn needed more protein. I am working so hard physically that I simply must have protein and I’m being told that most vegetable proteins aren’t a good idea yet. I have to have something other than just turkey. Have to.

But maybe I don’t get fruit any more. That makes me really sad. I’m hungry and I want sweet so fucking bad. It hurts. It physically hurts with how much I want to have something sweet. A banana isn’t really what I want but I get a few hours of reprieve from the grinding desire for sugar.

Yesterday I felt much more hopeful and happy. Today I’m crying. Today I wake up to, “Well should I revert back to rice and turkey and the three vegetables and I get nothing else today so that hopefully tomorrow I can have normal poop and then maybe I can try something?

Partially I’m freaking out because I leave for Hawaii in five days. Am I bringing a large cooler full of steamed rice and turkey? Is that the only way I will eat on the trip or will I just have wicked diarrhea the whole time?

I don’t know what the right answer is. I’m hungry. I want food. I want a variety of foods. I want meat and vegetables and fruit and I WANT FUCKING WHEAT.

Egg is the only for-sure no. The fruit might be too. That makes me very sad.

If I get to the point of only being able to eat 10 things, is my life going to be worth living? If I can essentially never eat out again or never go to someones house… is that a life?

Today I feel scared and sad. My body doesn’t feel good. And I’ll I’m supposed to eat is fucking rice cereal with fucking rice milk. I’d rather not eat at all. I’d rather spend the time in the bathroom cutting. All of this food is starting to feel like self-hate.

Noah continues to make our normal, varied, fucking tasty food for him and the kids. Eating with them makes me cry. If only I weren’t so bad I wouldn’t have to be punished. If I was capable of being good, I would be allowed food.

I’m glad we don’t have anything scheduled today. I don’t really need to talk to anyone. I’m going to sit here and cry and feel sorry for myself.

This right here is why I have never made it so far on an elimination diet.

Good list, bad list

Given my bathroom experiences of today (I have yet more REAL HONEST TO GOODNESS POOP!!!!!) I would say that this experiment *is* yielding results.

Good list:

rice, turkey, carrots, cabbage, bell peppers, venison, banana, maple syrup, grapes

Know for certain that these things are totally ok.

Maybe list:

raspberry

Bad list:

eggs, carbonation

 

It’s a start. Better than I knew three weeks ago.

Day 17

Breakfast: this unsweetened rice cereal shit is shitty. I’m just saying. And eating it with fucking rice milk is just gross. Oh man. I’m having it with grape juice so I can swallow ALL THE PILLS. I can’t swallow pills with water. I throw them up. Souvenir of overdosing.

For the record I’m taking: birth control pills (supposedly as a mood stabilizer–Noah and I don’t think it is helping), SAM-E (some other mood stabilizer kinda supplement my shrink wants me on), fish oil (mood management), B-Complex (filling in the gaps on my shitty diet and mood management), probiotic (gut health), Ibuprofen (I’ve been taking one a day for a while because I hurt so fucking much), and some days I take my pot pills. Not every day.

I tried swallowing the pills with water. I puked.

lunch and dinner came out of the same pot: I made fried rice with the last of the rice I made using the onion powder containing broth. So that contaminant will be out again soon. I had this totally weird moment where I looked in the fridge wondering what I would use for the fried rice and I saw the bell pepper and thought, “I’m having fucking bell pepper. They can’t take everything away from me. I’M EATING MY GOD DAMN BELL PEPPER.” And that was really weird for me. I didn’t eat vegetables until I was in my late teens because my fiance forced me to eat that shit. I didn’t start eating bell peppers by choice till my late 20’s. This was a weird moment. I also included carrot (less enthusiasm but still important) and cabbage with the turkey. I stir fry in olive oil (cold pressed or I’m not supposed to eat it) and use salt and pepper. It tasted better than you would think after the deprivation of the last few weeks.

Lots of peppermint tea. Supposedly it is cooling to the intestines.

Today gets a cut tag for all the poop. Oh man. Continue reading

Just can’t.

I feel guilty, but I can’t sit at the table and watch them eat this morning. They are eating pancakes and muffin and eggs. I’m eating shitty rice cereal with shitty rice milk. I’m having grape juice so I can handle swallowing pills. I literally can’t do it with water. I throw the pills back up.

I feel bad physically. This morning started with several bouts of violent diarrhea. I feel sad and yet hopeful. I hope it was the egg. I hope. I pray. I hope I have one indicator god fucking damnit.

I’m trying to not take my extreme grumpiness out on every one around me but I am not sure how successful I am being. I’m apologizing a lot. I don’t really think it makes anything better. But I don’t have the pause before I emote asshole-ness and there isn’t anything else I can do but apologize.

I’m feeling like I should stay home pretty indefinitely and not talk to anyone. I’m not a nice person. It is hard to be polite enough when I feel like this. I mostly managed to stay civil with the moms at the park yesterday (I think) but it is really hard to monitor my tone when my body hurts like this.

I feel like I should stop reading about diarrhea on the internet. So. Much. Conflicting. Information. These lists of foods directly contradict one another. As in: from one dietician to another one will say asparagus is a no-no and the next says eat lots of it. Some say I shouldn’t be eating *any* rice and some say I should be eating *only* rice.

I’ve gotta say, I attained poop *with* the nuts and nightshades in my diet. Then I went one day without, had some egg, and there is an instant return to violent diarrhea. That makes me wonder if I should bother with taking the nightshades and nuts out. But egg is staying out for a bit.

I don’t think I am going to be physically capable of taking out all the vegetables. I fucking need some bulk in my stomach. And I can’t stay on just turkey for weeks. Unfortunately I have a “delicate system” and if I try to eat too repetitively of foods I don’t like that much I will vomit and vomit and vomit. My body is more contrary than my personality. Which is a stretch. I find it annoying how self-defeating I am.

For all my fuss and whine the kids and I had a decent day together yesterday. They are being ridiculously understanding of my moodiness. “Mom, it sucks that you can’t eat anything tasty. I’d be grumpy too.”

We also had a detailed, hilarious, conversation about buying clothing for the children. I told them that when they don’t care about the stuff five minutes after I buy it I feel less impetus to buy anything else in the future. They can have the basics and not a lot more. Ingratitude is a real hot button for me. Shanna asked me how she could show more gratitude so that I would be happier about buying her stuff. So we talked about sucking up and the difference between that and begging. They practiced a bit and I gave them feedback on, “That’s not sucking up that is begging–and closer to pestering than begging.” Demanding that you get something is *not* sucking up.

I found it pretty funny. I’m ok with talking about these things bluntly. If you want me to do things for you, I need something back. I don’t need groveling. But if you start bitching loudly about how something isn’t that great right after I spend money on it… I’m taking it back to the store and forget you. Especially when it isn’t something you need. You are not entitled to luxuries, buddy.

(Specifically: she asked me to get her a Merida dress for Halloween. I did. Her grandmother sent an Elsa dress the week of Halloween and all of a sudden she spent a lot of time shit talking the Merida dress and how it isn’t as nice. I was not a happy camper. Other than the fact that the sewing on the Merida dress wasn’t amazing (split seams all over the fucking place) it was a really cool costume. Luckily Pam can sew better than me and she was here when we noticed all the seams and she fixed the dress. I am so grateful for my friends.)

I talked about how I feel sad that I put effort into negotiating with her over what she wanted, getting the supplementary accessories, and I spent a bunch of money. If you start shit talking less than a week after I get you something I won’t want to do it next time. This feels really bad. I feel like I wasted time and money and I don’t like that feeling. I have other uses for my time and money.

If you are actually happy about what I do and nice to me… I’m happy to do lots for you. Lots. LOTS. But I need something back.

I don’t need 24/7 groveling. That’s annoying. I don’t need you to only agree with me and I don’t need to have you parrot my opinions. I just want you to express appreciation for my effort. If you don’t I will stop putting effort into you.

I god damn need those words of affirmation. Or I feel like I should die because I am stupid and I try really hard for people who don’t care anyway. If I don’t get that acknowledgment I feel like an unworthy piece of shit. Is it fair? No. But it is.

I figure the best thing I can do is be as clear as possible about how important it is to me. I need acknowledgment.

I feel like I’m not doing enough for my family lately. But I also feel entirely out of spoons. I could use a full week of hiding under my bed. I used to do that. Just take a week off of school and hide.

I feel so yucky. My body hurts so much. I want to cry.

Day 16: two steps forward, three steps back

Breakfast: puffed rice cereal with rice milk and some turkey lunch meat.

Lunch: stir fry made with leftover rice, green beans, carrots, salt, pepper, leftover blueberry chicken, and olive oil. Remarkably tasty.

2nd lunch: rice cooked with vegetable broth (so technically tainted with onion powder) and turkey lunch meat.

dinner: rice cooked with vegetable broth (I read the fucking label after I dumped two cups in the rice cooker), turkey, grapes, and a little bit of egg.

 

5am-long, thing mostly formed. Pencil thin and brown.

5:50pm- REAL POOP. I POOPED. I POOPED!!! Ahem. Brown and formed and everything.

I spent this day feeling like shit. My whole body hurts. Massive headache. Joint pain. Stomach/abdominal pain. I suspect a lot of the pain is weight lifting but oh holy hell it is intense.

I’m going to give you a preview. I had one more “real poop” after midnight. Then for day 17 I woke up with truly wicked diarrhea. The kind that is entirely liquid and yuck and burning. I don’t think the egg agreed with me.

Day 15

My last hurrah day. After this my diet narrows even more. To that I say: fuck my life. I will be cutting nightshades and nuts.

Breakfast: gf pancakes (made with almond milk), banana, peanut butter, pecans, maple syrup

Lunch: the last of the soup with nightshades

Dinner: rice, fried potatoes, chicken with blueberry and maple syrup, green beans

Dessert: grape juice and a banana

 

Two visits to the bathroom. One at 3:30 am and one at 12:15pm. The first time was lots and lots of quantity and very dark brown grainy and totally unformed. The second time I had a few discrete pieces, which is awesome, but they were really thin and pencil like (in that way that indicates gall bladder problems).

Worth mentioning that I did 4.5 miles of running and over an hour of weight lifting with Noah.

My whole body hurts. Every part of me. I have a headache so bad I would cheerfully beat my head on concrete just for the distraction. I feel worse and worse with every passing day. It isn’t even just that I’m hungry (though I am).

Also: now I have a fucking cold.

Day 14

Breakfast: gf pancakes (With almond milk), peanut butter, pecans, banana, maple syrup

Lunch: (raw veggies because it was a picnic and fuss and oh man) carrots, cucumber, turkey, potato chips, grapes, banana

Dinner: green beans, rice, chicken cooked with blueberries and maple syrup (Noah loves me)

I drank a scant cup of grape juice and peppermint tea.

Continue reading

So many big feelings.

Over the past few days I’ve had this niggling little thing in the back of my mind. I feel very upset by someone joking that they “don’t love me enough” to do something. But I’ve been turning it over and turning it over and turning it over and as I’ve gone through a variety of adrenalized states I’ve had access to a lot of memories that are normally kind of buried because I don’t know about you but my memory is a funny place. I remember best the things that happened when I was in the same emotional state I am in right now. So I’ve had a lot of interesting memories surfacing.

I have totally made that joke. Not once. Not to one person. Many, many times. I’m pretty sure I went through a phase where I was saying it to a bunch of people with great regularity. When I think super duper duper hard… I may have said it to that person before.

Well shit. That means I have to get off my fucking high horse.

I really hate it when that happens.

Part of the trouble is, I have a lot of sympathy for all the circumstantial reasons behind it coming up last week. I didn’t expect her to jump up and abruptly change her day for me. That wasn’t on my agenda. I wasn’t gunning for that. She was responding to feeling overwhelmed and the things in front of her were things she couldn’t drop. So she joked. Ok, I hated the joke and it made me feel bad… but she didn’t say it because she consciously wanted to hurt me.

I didn’t actually want to hurt people when I used to say, “You are really awesome and all but I don’t love you enough to drive to Davis for a relationship.”

I said that a lot.

Man I’m such a hypocritical asshole.

It doesn’t help that the last two things I’ve tried to schedule at the house flopped. I “understand” that it was scheduling issues. That totally happens. But in both cases I started out with a whole bunch of enthusiastic people and then they all… kinda flaked. It happens. But it feels bad when large groups of people all do it together. I tried having an event in September and I tried in October. Both just failed. I’m not angry at anyone–but I feel wounded and like if I hadn’t already stupidly announced the holiday open house I would cheerfully hide alone in my house till spring.

I don’t feel very loved. So having one of my closest friends joke that she doesn’t love me… it was stepping on my broken toe. I “get” that it was a “joke”.

But I don’t feel very loved so it doesn’t feel like a joke it feels like just telling me the truth. One of the hardest parts of having big gaps in between people is I hold on to the bad feelings of being rejected and and unloved for a long time. Seeing different people doesn’t help that much. Maybe it is a distraction and maybe not.

It isn’t Noah or the kids fault that I don’t feel loved. It isn’t the fault of this joke. I’m just in that kind of cycle. I’m sure the elimination diet isn’t helping. I’m also trying hormonal birth control for the first time in many years and it is NOT REGULATING MY EMOTIONS. I’ve been trying to take vitamins which is resulting in spontaneous vomiting in the morning. The class over the last two weekends was physically and emotionally draining in the extreme. In that 24 hour class I put out more energy and force than I normally do in over a month. My body hurts everywhere. I have some truly impressive bruises.

I’m having trouble feeling loved. Even with the kids. It doesn’t feel like love, it feels like momentary manipulation so I will do what you want. I recognize this as a problem in my perception and not a change in how my children treat me. Their actual attempts to manipulate are far less subtle and nuanced. They are quite charming, really—it’s different than when they are being loving. But I just can’t see it. I feel very empty and hollow.

I’m a weird introvert/extrovert blend. I need alone time and I NEED people time. I need the right kinds of people time to fill me up or I get emptier and emptier. I haven’t been getting “the right kind” of people time much lately. I get most of it with Noah or Pam and I get very little actual attention from either of them because the kids are always in our faces demanding all of the attention. I’m scared of Pam going to Taiwan soon. I am going to miss her.

Over the past few years we’ve had a series of wonderful people who come over once a week for dinner for long periods of time. Sometimes we have two wonderful people at once who come by weekly. It has been just Pam for a while. I really like Pam, unfortunately so do my children. The kids vocally and clearly negotiate how much time they have to share with me because they want all of Pam’s attention. It’s funny.

People stop coming for a variety of reason. My favorite reason to ascribe it to is because I’m an asshole.

A stopped coming because after I drew him extensive graphs and charts to describe how tired I was and I said I needed help he continued to expect me to wait on him hand and foot like I have since I was 19. I stopped inviting him over because I can’t be the god damn service submissive forever and either you help or I can’t do this.

P had health issues. It wasn’t personal.

C I specifically uninvited because I got to the point of feeling actually unsafe in his presence. That’s a good enough reason to uninvite people in my opinion.

It’s a mixed bag that in my youth I went out looking for perverts and people who felt dangerous. It means I look at my friends in new lights when it comes to sharing my children with them.

Pam is the only person currently on a steady roster. Even the home schoolers who supposedly are supposed to have a set day of fun stuff… we skip it more than we go. We see home schoolers every week, but which day and where move around a lot. I am very very certain that my kids need to have friends of their own. I make it happen. I take them to places where they can socialize and see the same kids and get to know people. It is a specific goal. You can’t home school your kids and keep them from having friends. That will fuck them up for life. Finding friends can be hard but I consider that one of my job duties.

I think it is funny that I do not prioritize teaching from a curriculum–I prioritize learning how social interactions work. I think that early life should be about learning how to manage people. You will have plenty of time for book learning later. I am trying to teach emotional regulation (which is a hilarious thing for me to teach) and boundaries. Those are the biggest and most important skills we work on with conscious intent.

Yesterday I was an asshole to Shanna. They like to reach through their toy bookshelf and grab all the jars of jam and bring them to their side and play with them. I mostly object because these are glass items and I already clean up a lot of broken glass and I don’t want to clean up broken glass plus sticky. I’ve asked them four or five times not to do this. So this time I screamed. I screamed, “It is not ok to play with my stuff. You have your own stuff. STOP USING MINE. IT BREAKS. I AM REALLY CRANKY ABOUT CLEANING UP ALL THE GLASS. JUST STOP IT.” So I’m an asshole but I’m not an asshole who will be picked up by CPS. Just a garden variety asshole.

Later in the day I was reading the internet and I saw one of those pithy quote things and it said, “In our house we only yell if there is a fire.” I felt floored. Oh man. How can I ask my kids not to yell if I am such a yeller.

So I read the quote to Shanna. She gave me a side eye rule and said, “I wouldn’t mind if that became a rule for our house.”

I looked at her for a few minutes. She didn’t quite meet my eye. I asked her how scared she felt that morning. She said, “Well, I knew you wouldn’t hit me or anything so I wasn’t *that* scared, but it makes my tummy feel really bad.” I nodded. I apologized. She apologized for playing with the jam jars again. We hugged.

I feel beyond blessed in my children. I feel I got unusually empathetic children and I get down on my knees thanking anyone who will listen daily. I am so grateful for the specific children I have. They really work for me. I don’t dislike other peoples children (well… sometimes I do but not mostly) but my kids are so well suited to me. Occasionally I witness family interactions where the parents and the kids aren’t well suited and I feel this surge of anxiety mixed with gratitude. That would be so hard. I’m so grateful I don’t have that specific issue.

Not that my kids are easy 100% of the time–ha.ha.ha. But we are annoying in compatible ways. It’s important.

A while back Pam told me I was too hard on my BFFs. I expect too much from them. She then let me know how much time she spends with her BFF and it isn’t much.

I feel like maybe I need to pull into myself for a while. Looking outside me for validation isn’t going well. Other people have the audacity to have bad days and they aren’t just sitting around waiting to have positive interactions with me. WTF.

On one hand I feel like what I would like to do is stay home and do projects and invite people over. On the other hand inviting people over doesn’t usually work and then I feel rejected so I think that I should just work by myself.

I’m feeling really sad. I have to forgive people for hurting me because they really didn’t mean to. And I’ve said basically the same thing so I can’t have more harsh boundaries.

But I don’t feel very loved lately. I’m not *blaming* anyone. I don’t think this feeling is the result of the actions of A, B, C, D, or E people. That’s not my point. I cycle through feelings. It happens. Right now I feel very alienated and alone. I have a Noah and a Shanna and a Calli who love me and never actually let me be alone so this feeling isn’t about “reality”.

But my relationship with my kids is only kind of about me. I have to very carefully always partition of the parts of me that would be problematic or dangerous. It is very hard to constantly censor everything I say so that I am only appropriate for my kids.

If you knew me before kids–did you think I would be physically capable of minding my mouth enough to be appropriate for children? Probably not.

But it comes at a cost. It comes at the cost of feeling like *I* am not important, just that there is someone standing here who is willing to work. If I could find a suitable replacement it would be better for everyone if I died. Then I would stop hurting people. No one would have to listen to my whining about how neeeeeeeedy I feel.

On Saturday during the Impact class we got to do a “custom fight”. You have the choice of battling an inner critic, an event from your past, or something you are afraid might happen. You can choose to have the battle be verbal or physical.

I went first because I knew I wouldn’t have the courage to say what I said after I heard what everyone else wanted to fight. I knew mine was going to seem “crazy” and “intense” compared to everything else.

I told them it was a combination of inner critic and past events. I told them I grew up in a family who had generations of alcoholism and drug addiction and incest. With all the beatings such a description implies. I told them that I knew all my life that I was the child of rape and no one had wanted me from the minute I was born. I told them about my family members telling me that I am a worthless whore–I should die and stop wasting the resources that should be spent on someone worthy.

My fight was super fucking intense. It went on and on. The suited instructor was really verbally awful. By the end I was crying and screaming “I am not your whore anymore” as I was viciously kicking him in the head.

If that had been a real fight with an unsuited person there would have been major hospital time. I’m happy about that.

I keep wondering what will happen if I ever run into my sister again. The funny thing is, I have about a 1% fear of getting randomly mugged or assaulted. I just don’t live in fear of that. I know people who have had it happen to them–I shouldn’t feel so shielded from that assault. But it is way outside my realm of experience and I have enough to be afraid of so I’ve just never spent brain cycles on worrying about it.

I’m scared I will run into my sister again. I strongly suspect that will turn into a fist fight. Given that she wanted to start one when I was 6 months pregnant I doubt her wrath has cooled. She has hated me all my life. “It is your fault that son of a bitch had three more years to rape me. Mom was ready to leave when you fucking came along.” Well, go ahead and hate me Sissy, but it wasn’t my fault I was born.

For all the bloody noses and bruises and wounds my sister gave me… I could cheerfully put her in the hospital. And I know her knee has already blown out more than once. The fight wouldn’t even have to last long.

It was funny at the end of the class. At my turn to reflect the instructors verbally noted that I came in with fighting skills and I was willing to adapt them. I said, “Well most of my other fights have ended in a trip to ER to deal with my injuries so I’m grateful to learn techniques that might prevent that.” As soon as the bruising goes down I am going to spend a lot of time with my punching bag practicing. But first the bruising needs to go down. My elbow fucking hurts.

Maybe it is just best to stay home alone for a few months. I’m needy and sad and I can’t hear what people say the way they mean it. I can only hear more reason to hurt. That isn’t about everyone standing near me–that comes from me.

Today is the Halloween parade at park day. I’m supposed to bring a pot luck contribution. Fuck if I know what to bring. A tray of carrot and cucumber sticks? I can bring you a fuck ton of bok choy. Want some plain rice? fuck my life.

Just to add a little bonus gross to this entry: I’m weirded out that since I bought the bell peppers my poop looks like it is sprinkled with little red confetti. I really don’t digest food much.

I need to get back on the horse with half marathon training. I semi-slacked in the week between the Impact classes because I felt so dead. Today is a five mile run. I feel continually shocked that five miles is no big deal. I’m debating between running in the dark before Noah goes to work (I would have to leave in about half an hour) or taking the kids to the gym so I can run on a treadmill. I mostly prefer running outside. But I’m not sure I have it in me to run in the dark today. I feel wobbly. In the dark, when I’m wobbly–I trip. And it hurts. So I’m kind of loathe to go do that on my already injured body. Even my ankle is feeling twingy and sore. Treadmill it is.

I’m at the point on the elimination diet where I’m 14 days in and I haven’t seen much change. This is all fairly normal poop to me. That makes me think I should take out nightshades next. This thought makes me want to cry. I won’t until I finish eating the current cooked nightshades, because I’m not so big on throwing food away, but I probably should.

I feel so bad. The really sad/scary thing about taking the nightshades out: it removes almost all of the GF “bread” stuff I could eat. No more pancakes. I’m going to be eating rice at every meal. (I’m vaguely aware that there are products like millet and couscous in the world but I have essentially never eaten them and switching to them on an elimination diet seems… kind of weird. Should I really be randomly switching to food I’ve never eaten?” If I have to long-term follow these restrictions it makes sense to introduce them after a while… but not during the elimination diet, right? I don’t fucking know.

A friend offered to make a meal plan. I don’t want one. This is a moving target. This is hard. I am so frustrated. What I can handle putting in my mouth shifts from moment to moment and day to day. I feel so much hatred and anger all wrapped up in food. Nothing good comes from food. Unless it has lots of wheat, dairy and sugar. Then the food carries love.

Noah isn’t even cooking much for me. Which is another sad thing. This stupid elimination diet is taking away one of the most common things someone does to express love for me. No wonder I don’t feel very loved lately.

This moment isn’t forever. But it is shitty. And I feel sad. I don’t want to go pretend to be happy and festive and part of a group today. I want to wedge myself between the wall and the bed and cry.

The main thing I can think of that would make today easier is if I went into the bathroom and locked the door and lighted my candles and got out the scalpel blade that is secretly hiding in a drawer in my room (I no longer have a handle, but I somehow missed a blade when I cleared out the house a while ago) and cut for a long time. I want that feeling so bad. I am not calm and I could be. I care too much about feeling unlovable and I could shut that off. It would just take a few cuts. Then I would be calm and sure that I’m not loved and that is just how it is. I wouldn’t feel frantic and sad. Just resigned. This is how things work.

I feel so sad. Not cutting at this point feels like not caring enough about me to take care of me. Instead I just force myself to feel as shitty as possible for as long as possible. Just so other people can feel better. It’s a reminder of how little I matter.

If I could find a suitable replacement I would go. I am tired of flailing and hurting. I’m so tired.

I want my mommy.

Days 12 & 13

I didn’t feel like typing yesterday.

Day 12-

Breakfast: unsweetened rice cereal (to get rid of the apple juice–it’s pretty gross), almond milk, blueberries, pecans

Lunch: home made soup with turkey stock, bits of turkey, bell pepper, carrot, cabbage, bok choy, tomato, and rice

Dinner: fried potato and more stir fry.

 

Day 13-

Breakfast: GF English muffin with raspberry jam, fried potatoes, banana

Snack: big bowl of the turkey soup

next Snack: almond milk ice cream (I ate like 1/4 of a cup) and grapes

Lunch: GF pancakes cooked in ghee, (mix uses almond milk), with banana, pecans, maple syrup and peanut butter. This meal was the best meal I’ve eaten since the beginning of this diet. I felt really full and happy when I was done eating. It was dramatic.

Dinner: more soup.

Now on to the poop.

Continue reading

Day 11

Breakfast: last of the peanut butter puff cereal with corn so corn should be out of my diet at this point, I think it is the last item. I also had rice porridge for second breakfast.

Lunch: rice, chicken (more of yesterday’s recipe) with stir fry (bok choy, carrot, bell pepper, and cabbage) and a banana.

Dinner: exactly the same as lunch, including another banana.

Only two poops. My 4:30 poop was a soft cloud at the bottom with one floating chunk. Pretty brown. My 6pm poop had multiple discrete chunks! That were brown! They are still very soft of course, but any sign of packing-together is a good sign. I’m still crossing my fingers as I feel hopeless and dispirited.